CHAPTER XX

"Comrades!" the voice of Pavel was heard. "Soldiers are people the
same as ourselves. They will not strike us! Why should they beat
us? Because we bear the truth necessary for all? This our truth is
necessary to them, too. Just now they do not understand this; but
the time is nearing when they will rise with us, when they will
march, not under the banner of robbers and murderers, the banner
which the liars and beasts order them to call the banner of glory
and honor, but under our banner of freedom and goodness! We ought
to go forward so that they should understand our truth the sooner.
Forward, comrades! Ever forward!"

Pavel's voice sounded firm, the words rang in the air distinctly.
But the crowd fell asunder; one after the other the people dropped
off to the right or to the left, going toward their homes, or
leaning against the fences. Now the crowd had the shape of a wedge,
and its point was Pavel, over whose head the banner of the laboring
people was burning red.

At the end of the street, closing the exit to the square, the mother
saw a low, gray wall of men, one just like the other, without faces.
On the shoulder of each a bayonet was smiling its thin, chill smile;
and from this entire immobile wall a cold gust blew down on the
workmen, striking the breast of the mother and penetrating her heart.

She forced her way into the crowd among people familiar to her, and,
as it were, leaned on them.

She pressed closely against a tall, lame man with a clean-shaven
face. In order to look at her, he had to turn his head stiffly.

"A-ha-ha-ha!" some one exclaimed derisively. "They've struck up a
funeral song, the dirty dogs!"

"Beat him!" came the angry response.

The mother clasped her hands to her breast, looked about and saw
that the crowd, before so dense, was now standing irresolute,
watching the comrades walk away from them with the banner, followed
by about a dozen people, one of whom, however, at every forward
move, jumped aside as if the path in the middle of the street were
red hot and burned his soles.

"The tyranny will fall--" sounded the prophetic song from the
lips of Fedya.

"And the people will rise!" the chorus of powerful voices seconded
confidently and menacingly.

But the harmonious flow of the song was broken by the quiet words:

"He is giving orders."

"Charge bayonets!" came the piercing order from the front.

The bayonets curved in the air, and glittered sharply; then fell
and stretched out to confront the banner.

"Ma-arch!"

"They're coming!" said the lame man, and thrusting his hands into
his pockets made a long step to one side.

The mother, without blinking, looked on. The gray line of soldiers
tossed to and fro, and spread out over the entire width of the
street. It moved on evenly, coolly, carrying in front of itself a
fine-toothed comb of sparkling bayonets. Then it came to a stand.
The mother took long steps to get nearer to her son. She saw how
Andrey strode ahead of Pavel and fenced him off with his long body.
"Get alongside of me!" Pavel shouted sharply. Andrey was singing,
his hands clasped behind his back, his head uplifted. Pavel pushed
him with his shoulder, and again cried:

"At my side! Let the banner be in front!"

"Disperse!" called a little officer in a thin voice, brandishing
a white saber. He lifted his feet high, and without bending his
knees struck his soles on the ground irritably. The high polish
on his boots caught the eyes of the mother.

To one side and somewhat behind him walked a tall, clean-shaven man,
with a thick, gray mustache. He wore a long gray overcoat with a
red underlining, and yellow stripes on his trousers. His gait was
heavy, and like the Little Russian, he clasped his hands behind his
back. He regarded Pavel, raising his thick gray eyebrows.

The mother seemed to be looking into infinity. At each breath her
breast was ready to burst with a loud cry. It choked her, but for
some reason she restrained it. Her hands clutched at her bosom.
She staggered from repeated thrusts. She walked onward without
thought, almost without consciousness. She felt that behind her
the crowd was getting thinner; a cold wind had blown on them and
scattered them like autumn leaves.

The men around the red banner moved closer and closer together.
The faces of the soldiers were clearly seen across the entire width
of the street, monstrously flattened, stretched out in a dirty
yellowish band. In it were unevenly set variously colored eyes,
and in front the sharp bayonets glittered crudely. Directed against
the breasts of the people, although not yet touching them, they
drove them apart, pushing one man after the other away from the
crowd and breaking it up.

Behind her the mother heard the trampling noise of those who were
running away. Suppressed, excited voices cried:

Nikolay drew his hand back as if it had been burned. The song died
away. Some persons crowded solidly around Pavel; but he cut through
to the front. A sudden silence fell.

Around the banner some twenty men were grouped, not more, but they
stood firmly. The mother felt drawn to them by awe and by a
confused desire to say something to them.

"Take this thing away from him, lieutenant." The even voice of the
tall old man was heard. He pointed to the banner. A little officer
jumped up to Pavel, snatched at the flag pole, and shouted shrilly:

"Drop it!"

The red flag trembled in the air, moving to the right and to the
left, then rose again. The little officer jumped back and sat down.
Nikolay darted by the mother, shaking his outstretched fist.

"Seize them!" the old man roared, stamping his feet. A few soldiers
jumped to the front, one of them flourishing the butt end of his
gun. The banner trembled, dropped, and disappeared in a gray mass
of soldiers.

"Oh!" somebody groaned aloud. And the mother yelled like a wild
animal. But the clear voice of Pavel answered her from out of the
crowd of soldiers:

"Good-by, mother! Good-by, dear!"

"He's alive! He remembered!" were the two strokes at the mother's heart.

"Good-by, mother dear!" came from Andrey.

Waving her bands, she raised herself on tiptoe, and tried to see
them. There was the round face of Andrey above the soldiers' heads.
He was smiling and bowing to her.

"Oh, my dear ones! Andriusha! Pasha!" she shouted.

"Good-by, comrades!" they called from among the soldiers.

A broken, manifold echo responded to them. It resounded from the
windows and the roofs.

The mother felt some one pushing her breast. Through the mist in
her eyes she saw the little officer. His face was red and strained,
and he was shouting to her:

"Clear out of here, old woman!"

She looked down on him, and at his feet saw the flag pole broken in
two parts, a piece of red cloth on one of them. She bent down and
picked it up. The officer snatched it out of her hands, threw it
aside, and shouted again, stamping his feet:

The mother staggered to the fragment of the pole, which he had
thrown down, and picked it up again.

"Gag them!"

The song became confused, trembled, expired. Somebody took the mother
by the shoulders, turned her around, and shoved her from the back.

"Go, go! Clear the street!" shouted the officer.

About ten paces from her, the mother again saw a thick crowd of
people. They were howling, grumbling, whistling, as they backed
down the street. The yards were drawing in a number of them.

"Go, you devil!" a young soldier with a big mustache shouted right
into the mother's ear. He brushed against her and shoved her onto
the sidewalk. She moved away, leaning on the flag pole. She went
quickly and lightly, but her legs bent under her. In order not to
fall she clung to walls and fences. People in front were falling back
alongside of her, and behind her were soldiers, shouting: "Go, go!"

The soldiers got ahead of her; she stopped and looked around. Down
the end of the street she saw them again scattered in a thin chain,
blocking the entrance to the square, which was empty. Farther down
were more gray figures slowly moving against the people. She wanted
to go back; but uncalculatingly went forward again, and came to a
narrow, empty by-street into which she turned. She stopped again.
She sighed painfully, and listened. Somewhere ahead she heard the
hum of voices. Leaning on the pole she resumed her walk. Her
eyebrows moved up and down, and she suddenly broke into a sweat; her
lips quivered; she waved her hands, and certain words flashed up in
her heart like sparks, kindling in her a strong, stubborn desire to
speak them, to shout them.

The by-street turned abruptly to the left; and around the corner the
mother saw a large, dense crowd of people. Somebody's voice was
speaking loudly and firmly:

"Just look at them. Soldiers advance against them, and they stand
before them without fear. Y-yes!"

"Think of Pasha Vlasov!"

"And how about the Little Russian?"

"Hands behind his back and smiling, the devil!"

"My dear ones! My people!" the mother shouted, pushing into the crowd.
They cleared the way for her respectfully. Somebody laughed:

"Look at her with the flag in her hand!"

"Shut up!" said another man sternly.

The mother with a broad sweep of her arms cried out:

"Listen for the sake of Christ! You are all dear people, you are
all good people. Open up your hearts. Look around without fear,
without terror. Our children are going into the world. Our children
are going, our blood is going for the truth; with honesty in their
hearts they open the gates of the new road--a straight, wide road
for all. For all of you, for the sake of your young ones, they have
devoted themselves to the sacred cause. They seek the sun of new
days that shall always be bright. They want another life, the life
of truth and justice, of goodness for all."

Her heart was rent asunder, her breast contracted, her throat was
hot and dry. Deep inside of her, words were being born, words of a
great, all-embracing love. They burned her tongue, moving it more
powerfully and more freely. She saw that the people were listening
to her words. All were silent. She felt that they were thinking as
they surrounded her closely; and the desire grew in her, now a clear
desire, to drive these people to follow her son, to follow Andrey,
to follow all those who had fallen into the soldiers' hands, all
those who were left entirely alone, all those who were abandoned.
Looking at the sullen, attentive faces around her, she resumed with
soft force:

"Our children are going in the world toward happiness. They went
for the sake of all, and for Christ's truth--against all with which
our malicious, false, avaricious ones have captured, tied, and
crushed us. My dear ones--why it is for you that our young blood
rose--for all the people, for all the world, for all the workingmen,
they went! Then don't go away from them, don't renounce, don't forsake
them, don't leave your children on a lonely path--they went just for
the purpose of showing you all the path to truth, to take all on that
path! Pity yourselves! Love them! Understand the children's hearts.
Believe your sons' hearts; they have brought forth the truth; it
burns in them; they perish for it. Believe them!"

Her voice broke down, she staggered, her strength gone. Somebody
seized her under the arms.

He was pale, his disheveled beard shook. Suddenly knitting his
brows he threw a stern glance about him on all, drew himself up to
his full height, and said distinctly:

"My son Matvey was crushed in the factory. You know it! But were
he alive, I myself would have sent him into the lines of those--
along with them. I myself would have told him: 'Go you, too,
Matvey! That's the right cause, that's the honest cause!'"

He stopped abruptly, and a sullen silence fell on all, in the
powerful grip of something huge and new, but something that no
longer frightened them. Sizov lifted his hand, shook it, and
continued:

"It's an old man who is speaking to you. You know me! I've been
working here thirty-nine years, and I've been alive fifty-three
years. To-day they've arrested my nephew, a pure and intelligent
boy. He, too, was in the front, side by side with Vlasov; right at
the banner." Sizov made a motion with his hand, shrank together,
and said as he took the mother's hand: "This woman spoke the truth.
Our children want to live honorably, according to reason, and we
have abandoned them; we walked away, yes! Go, Nilovna!"

"My dear ones!" she said, looking at them all with tearful eyes.
"The life is for our children and the earth is for them."

"Go, Nilovna, take this staff and lean upon it!" said Sizov, giving
her the fragment of the flag pole.

All looked at the mother with sadness and respect. A hum of
sympathy accompanied her. Sizov silently put the people out of her
way, and they silently moved aside, obeying a blind impulse to
follow her. They walked after her slowly, exchanging brief, subdued
remarks on the way. Arrived at the gate of her house, she turned to
them, leaning on the fragment of the flag pole, and bowed in gratitude.

"Thank you!" she said softly. And recalling the thought which she
fancied had been born in her heart, she said: "Our Lord Jesus Christ
would not have been, either, if people had not perished for his sake."

The crowd looked at her in silence.

She bowed to the people again, and went into her house, and Sizov,
drooping his head, went in with her.

The people stood at the gates and talked. Then they began to depart
slowly and quietly.